Dreams and Memories
by ice-crisis
Summary: Atobe takes some time out of practice to think of the past... AtoJi bad summary, sorry


Disclaimer: I owneth not PoT or it's characters, nor am I making any profit from this. (too bad...)

This is my first time posting, so please review! self-conscious and very nervous

**

* * *

**

**Dreams and Memories **

The pressure on his shoulder was starting to make his arm go numb.

Atobe shifted a little and considered his options. It was a good thing he was right handed, he mused, because at this rate if he did not do something soon he would lose his ability to use his left. Of course, even being right handed would not be enough to save him the embarrassment that would come from being temporarily crippled. There was no question—something had to be done.

Soon, but not at this second.

Atobe continued to watch the practice match that was being played out on the court in front of him. It was a match between Hyoutei's two regular doubles teams, and at the moment the Ohtori and Shishido pair had the advantage. Oshitari and Mukahi were not playing badly, but their strategy lacked something when they played with people who knew them well. Mukahi especially liked to use the shock tactic, and that did not work so well with people who already knew his play style. It was really only Oshitari's abilities as a _tensai_ that was saving them from a rather humiliating defeat.

As he watched the ball, Atobe turned his head and, having slightly misjudged the distance, accidentally buried his nose in the golden curls resting on his shoulder. The smell of the other boy's shampoo invaded his senses and it was all he could do to keep from sneezing in a rather undignified way.

Also, his arm was now tingling.

There really was no question—he was going to have to solve this little problem now.

Atobe sighed a little, inaudibly, as he raised his right hand and shook Jiroh's shoulder in a rather dispirited attempt to wake him. Jiroh's only response was to mutter something incoherent, shift a little, turn a little, and latch on to Atobe's arm.

Atobe tried again, this time with no effect whatsoever.

"Ore-sama is not a stuffed animal," he muttered haughtily, but he let go of the other boy's shoulder and went back to trying to look like the situationwas something he had fully anticipated and agreed to before hand and not as though he had just been treated like an over-large teddy bear. It was his own fault anyway, he supposed, for letting Jiroh start sleeping on him in the first place. Sometimes he wondered why he had.

Other people had told him that he was unusually kind to the other boy and that it was a credit to his character that he treated his narcoleptic classmate so gently. Atobe had to resist scoffing at them. Often he did not even bother to try.

Atobe had known Jiroh for a long time. They had taken classes together when they were younger and since their days in elementary school they had been friends. Their history together might have been what led to Atobe's indulgence. Either way, Atobe had never considered Jiroh to be narcoleptic. No one who had known him back then possibly could.

When Jiroh was little he was incessantly cheerful and energetic. He was one of those kids that would have been a handful if he had not been so sweet—the kind that the teachers adored despite themselves and would take every opportunity to coo over. He had always been wide awake then. Indeed, Atobe would have been surprised that anyone so excited could ever fall asleep during the day, even during class. He was always awake, always cheerful, always smiling and happy.

Then one day several years ago, during recess, when the other children were all out on the playground, Atobe had found Jiroh curled up on a bench, fast asleep. Worried that his friend might be sick, Atobe had shaken him awake. He was fine, Jiroh had assured him, it was just that he'd had a wonderful dream the night before and he had wanted so badly to see if it continued that he'd decided to take a nap. With that, he went back to sleep. An hour later, when class resumed, he was back to his normal, adorable, slightly hyper-active self. Atobe hadn't thought about it again until the next week, when his friend routinely started to sleep through recess. Even then it didn't seem to be a problem. Jiroh was always awake for the rest of the day. He just liked to nap on occasion.

Then, two weeks after that, Jiroh had fallen asleep in class for the first time. Their teacher, who had been somewhat surprised, had roused him quickly and told him to please pay closer attention. Jiroh had apologized, somewhat sheepishly, and had laser focus through the rest of the lesson. The next day, however, he had fallen asleep again. That time, after the teacher had woken him up, he had waited for five minutes and then collapsed back onto his desk.

It happened slowly, but as time carried on Jiroh began spending more and more of the day asleep. The process was slow enough that no one thought about it much, or worried about it. The people who knew him had gotten used to it and the ones who didn't, the new teachers, the new classmates, sometimes even the people who found him sleeping in odd places after school, were all assured that it was just the way he was.

No one knew why exactly it was that Jiroh slept so much. People called him narcoleptic but when this theory had been posed to Jiroh himself he had laughed a little and shaken his head. He didn't elaborate. He didn't need too. The truth of it was that Jiroh just liked to sleep. When people asked him why he slept all the time, and when he was awake to answer, he told them that he didn't see any reason not to. He had told Atobe one day, maybe two years ago now, that his dreams were so beautiful that he couldn't resist them. Atobe had inferred from this, rightly he was sure, that Jiroh preferred his dreams to life.

It was certainly true that when Jiroh was fully awake it was because he was excited and happy. Sometimes it seemed to Atobe that Jiroh had found the solution to the puzzle of how to find happiness: only stay awake for the good parts of life.

At other times Atobe wondered just what it was that Jiroh dreamed about that was so much better than reality.

He couldn't feel his arm anymore. The pressure of Jiroh's body and the added tight grip of the boy's arms had finally made it go numb. There was no way to avoid it—he was going to have to wake the boy up or risk permanent damage to his arm.

Atobe raised his hand once more and attempted to wake the sleeper. Jiroh didn't wake up. He squirmed a little and then, if anything, he clung tighter to Atobe's arm, further cutting off the circulation.

Really, though, this was becoming embarrassing. Atobe frowned. He was beginning to worry a little about what the others would think, not to mention the possibility that the feeling would never come back to his arm. He was about ready to shove the boy off of him and let him wake up when he hit the ground… but he looked at Jiroh's sleeping form and he hesitated.

It wasn't a coincidence that he stopped. If it had been anyone else they would be on the ground by now—but then, if it had been anyone else they wouldn't have been permitted to sleep on the almighty Atobe's shoulder in the first place. While being close friends with someone was not normally something that stopped him from treating them like, well, servants, it was difficult even for Atobe to treat Jiroh as a subordinate. The boy was too kind, too… needy to be abused that way. Atobe half suspected sometimes that if Jiroh did not display such affection and need towards Atobe, Atobe would not be half as friendly towards him. It was like an indisputable assurance that yes, Atobe really was amazing.

He always felt a certain unlabeled anxiety whenever he needed to wake his friend. It wasn't that he felt guilty about disturbing his sleep; normally no one even tried to wake Jiroh unless they had to, partially because it would annoy Atobe and partially because it was nearly impossible. Jiroh knew that, and he knew that usually if he was being shaken awake that it was for something important, like a tennis match or... a tennis match. Atobe never had any compunctions about rousing the boy, much as Atobe rarely had scruples at all when it came to respecting others. Nevertheless, whenever he was called on to wake him Atobe sometimes felt nervous, just for a few seconds, before Jiroh was yawning and stretching and asking him what was going on.

It was one of his best kept secrets. As the years wore on Jiroh had gradually started to sleep more and more. He became more likely to doze off and harder to wake. He'd never admit it, not even to himself, but one of Atobe's deepest fears was that one day, Jiroh would never wake up again.

Jiroh murmured something in his sleep and smiled slightly.

For the millionth time, Atobe wondered what Jiroh dreamed about that was wonderful enough to waste his life for, what was so appealing about his dreams that made them better than the waking, even when it was Atobe who was waking him. Atobe wondered how anything could compete with dreams that were that much better than reality.

Atobe turned back to the match, which was coming to a close. Oshitari and Mukahi had made a come-back, but Ohtori and Shishido were still leading and it wasn't hard to see how the game would end, certainly not for someone with Atobe's genius and Insight. He watched the match anyway, carefully, and made no indication that he was thinking of anything else.

Beside him, Jiroh slept on.

Jiroh dreamed.

He dreamed of a perfect world. It was a world of color and brilliance, excitement and happiness. A world of contentment. A world in which the only thing he had ever truly longed for was his. Yet he dreamed the world as it was, with one small difference.

To him, his dreams were the beauty of everything that he hoped could be.

If Jiroh had known that Atobe wondered what he dreamed of, he would have laughed. If Atobe had asked, he might have told him.

A strong voice, a gentle hand on his shoulder, a kiss, a sigh.

Jiroh knew that people thought he was strange. They saw him asleep and they thought that he was lazy, that he was self-indulgent. They didn't understand. Jiroh knew what the world was and he saw in his mind what it could be. If he chose one over the other it was only because sometimes, in our hearts, it is what we all wish we could do. But Jiroh was not lazy. He was patient. He was waiting. One day, Jiroh would wake up again and world would be just as he imagined.

Until that day, until his dreams came true, he would sleep, and Atobe would never know that Jiroh dreamed of him.

* * *

Thanks for reading! sorry if it was a bit dull... please review!


End file.
